The road was completely silent. Hai City no longer had the bustling nightlife it once did. Shi Qiao slightly opened the car window. The sound of insects entered his ears, and waves of heat rushed in.
He closed the window again.
“Before college, I lived in a mountain village. Nights there were like this too—completely dark, with stars especially bright, insects everywhere, and frogs croaking in the forest. After coming to Hai City for university, I never went back. The city lights were brighter than the stars… I didn’t expect…”
Shi Qiao did not continue, but everyone in the car fell silent. The apocalypse had only just begun. More severe environments still awaited them.
Soon, they followed the navigation and arrived at a gas station.
The station stood in the darkness, eerily quiet like a Western horror film set. Only the car headlights illuminated the area.
Gu Cheng walked toward the fuel nozzle, intending to pump fuel, but was stopped by Wang Che.
“The power is out. The fuel pumps don’t work. We need to access the underground storage tanks.”
Wei Jiawen swung his flashlight. “Here.”
Wang Che pulled Gu Cheng over. A few meters apart, there were covers on the ground—three storage tanks in total. Gu Cheng directly collected them into her Storage Space.
Fu Zhe and Wang Xin went to the convenience store nearby. It had already been looted, but there were still quite a few items left. They did not take them—mostly long shelf-life goods, so that passersby could still use them.
They continued collecting supplies from five gas stations along the way.
Finally, they arrived at the largest shopping mall in the city center.
The first floor was luxury fashion stores. Since they were already there, they took everything.
Upstairs were restaurants, chocolate shops, and ice cream stores.
Unfortunately, the expensive branded chocolates had completely melted. The canned ones might still be usable, so they took them first.
The ice cream shop’s raw materials were still intact. Wei Jiawen suggested taking them back to study the machines.
The food in the restaurants had already spoiled, but when they opened the kitchen freezers, the power had only just gone out, so everything was still frozen. Gu Cheng collected all the frozen ingredients.
They also passed through stores selling down jackets and snow boots, collecting items by size while leaving half behind.
The supermarket was on the basement level. The group moved top-down efficiently.
When they reached the supermarket floor, they found many people gathered there. Candles were lit at the entrance. Four men stood at the front, blocking the way with flashlights.
“This place is under our control now. You can’t go in.”
Fu Zhe stepped forward. “Move aside.”
The men shone their flashlights up and down at them. Seeing that they were young, well-dressed, and looked well-fed, they sneered.
“Don’t refuse a toast only to be forced to drink a forfeit. From now on, strength decides everything. If you want in, you need our approval.”
Without caring, Fu Zhe punched the speaking man square in the nose. Blood immediately poured out, and the man staggered back screaming.
The other three rushed forward together, but were quickly beaten down by Fu Zhe in a few moves.
All four men lay on the ground, unable to get up. The rest of the crowd did not dare to stop them.
The group walked in.
Flashlights revealed people hiding in corners.
They continued deeper, picking up snacks they had not bought before. Each of them carried large shopping bags. When they reached the freezers, they directly filled the bags with goods.
Because it was dark, Gu Cheng quietly stored items into her Storage Space while packing. Soon, all the freezers were emptied.
Shi Qiao signaled that he had found the warehouse.
They went there next. The door was open.
Wang Che and Gu Cheng went inside while the others stood guard outside.
The warehouse was extremely large.
Gu Cheng collected daily necessities—including sanitary products—completely.
Inside another cold storage room were vegetables, fruits, meat, and seafood. She collected everything. In just a couple of days, it would all spoil anyway.
There was no concern about being suspected. The guards at the entrance had not seen their faces clearly, and others in the dark could not see anything either.
After finishing, each of them carried a giant shopping bag out.
Back in the car, Gu Cheng transferred everything into her Storage Space. They had returned fully loaded.
Once inside the car, they immediately turned on the air conditioning. The cool breeze felt like heaven.
Wang Xin collapsed against Fu Zhe’s shoulder.
“Not having electricity is actually terrifying. All social order collapses. Those people smelled terrible. The environment has become extremely harsh.”
Fu Zhe gently wiped her sweat with tissues.
“Now you understand. No matter how realistic those novels seem, they are nothing compared to seeing it yourself. After the power goes out, fuel pumps stop working, clocks stop moving. Next will be gas outages and water cuts. All resources will be directed toward maintaining nuclear power plants to prevent leaks.”
Hearing this, Gu Cheng felt that her previous thinking had been far too naive. Without experiencing it, it was impossible to understand how difficult survival would become. This was only the beginning.
She slumped back into her seat, drained of energy.
It would be better if Thanos snapped his fingers and ended it all.
When they returned to the villa district, only one or two houses still had lights on. It felt like an entirely different world from what they had just experienced.
They said their goodnights, went back to shower, and slept without dreams.
The next evening, after discussion, they decided to go to the farmers’ market to see if any vegetables or fruits could still be salvaged. The cold storage was their main target.
Fu Zhe and Wang Xin stayed home. They had already experienced the blackout world yesterday and did not need to go again.
Gu Cheng looked at Wang Xin with envy—she also wanted to stay home and lie flat, but strength did not allow it.
Along the way, there were noticeably more insects. It made her skin crawl, so she closed her eyes to rest.
At the farmers’ market, they used flashlights and moved through aisle by aisle, selecting and collecting anything still fresh.
Soon, the entire market was emptied.
They passed several gas stations again and collected more fuel tanks.
After finishing for the day, they agreed not to go out anymore and to stay home and rest.
Days of “lying flat” were spent training physical fitness and combat skills.
A week later, the property management sent a notice:
The entire city had implemented rolling power and gas rationing—one hour per day. Water had also been cut off. The community now relied on solar power. Water could only be fetched from a nearby mountain river flowing down from the hills. Anyone who needed it could go there to collect water.
No matter how much the wealthy residents complained, the property management no longer responded.
Wei Jiawen took the water tanks and filters Gu Cheng had given him and finished installing them. He had installed them before, but now wanted more backups.
To “fit in,” the group drove a pickup truck carrying several water tanks to the river.
They saw the same servants from their previous supply run. Their condition was far worse now—thin, exhausted, and numb. Some even carried a sour stench, likely from not bathing or changing clothes.
Others were washing clothes downstream.
Unluckily, they also ran into Jiang Li and her group again. They had stocked a lot of supplies, so they were still doing relatively well, but the lack of water had made them look disheveled.
Jiang Li noticed that Gu Cheng and the others looked completely unchanged. In fact, they looked even fairer since they rarely went outside.
After the water cut, they could only wipe their bodies. Their hair had not been washed for three days. Today, they would finally use the collected water to wash their hair and bathe.
Some less particular bodyguards and staff had already jumped into the downstream river to bathe.
Wang Che and Fu Zhe quickly covered Wang Xin and Gu Cheng’s view.
The two of them felt it was a pity—there were quite a few abs there they hadn’t finished looking at yet.